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PHILOSOPHY OF SOUL
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monks. Monk Nandisena having practised self-restraint etc. acquired spiritual welfare.
Those are the debators who refute others' dogmatic views with the help of proofs, arguments and fundamentals. They represent third kind of propagators. Shri Mallavadi suri is the instance in point. He was the author of Dwadasharanaya chakra and other treatises and he gave a crushing defeat to Buddacharya at Broach.
Those great men who propagate religion with their mastery in the science of astrology and science of omens represent the fourth kind of propagators. Shri Bhadrabahu swami belonged to this kind of propagators.
Shri Bhadrabahu swami had a brother named Varah Mihira who was first initiated as a Jain but later on he renounced the faith and began condemning jain monks to imply his greatness_one day Varah Mihira cast the horoscope of the newly born prince and predicted that he would live for hundred years. Overjoyed with this prediction the king granted riches and honours upon Varah Mihira who remarked before the king that Bhadrabahu did not come to confer his congratulations upon the prince's birth.
The king made inquiries but Bhadrubahu replied: "It is no use coming twice as the prince will die on the seventh day being hurt by a cat".
The king on receiving this report banished all the cats out of the city and put up strong 'Bandobust to protect the prince.
On the seventh day when prince was sucking the nurse-mother, accidentally a bolt from the door being dislocated fell on the head of the prince producing fatal injuries. Varahamira blushed with shame and did not appear before the King. Swami Bhadrabahu approached the king and preached the nature of worldly affairs consoling him. The king highly applauding his erudition in astrology asked : "But how is it that the son did not die because of a cat?” Acharya ordered for the condemned bolt and to the great surprise of the king it was found that cat’s figure was carved on the bolt and allegorically speaking the prince was killed by a cat. The king became the Acharya's staunch devotee and thus Jainism spread better.
